The invention relates to a method and a device for manufacturing packets from pre-fabricated blanks made of thin cardboard or the like, especially for manufacturing cigarette packets of the hinge-lid type, the pre-fabricated blanks being delivered as piles of blanks and being led by a conveyor for piles of blanks to a packaging machine.
Hinge-lid packets are a widespread type of packaging for cigarettes. Hinge-lid packets consist characteristically of contoured blanks made of (thin) cardboard. Piles of blanks are generally delivered on pallets and are positioned in order to transfer the pile of blanks to the packaging machine. On the pallets, the piles of blanks are disposed in rows beside one another and in layers above one another.
Between the layers there is an intermediate blank, on which the blanks of the respective upper layer rest.
Lifting appliances of different kinds are known for raising the piles of blanks, individually or in groups, from the pallet or the respective intermediate blank and transfering them to the conveyor for the piles of blanks. Advantageous designs of lifting appliance are those on which individual piles of blanks are grasped on upright side faces, raised from the pallet or the intermediate blank and lowered on to the conveyor for the piles of blanks.
When the pallet is loaded (at the factory) with piles of blanks, during the transport of said blanks and during the removal of the piles of blanks from the pallet, it is not possible to avoid individual or a plurality of blanks from one pile being displaced sideways and thus portions of the blanks projecting over the contours of the pile of blanks. This is particularly true for the lower and upper regions of the pile of blanks, i.e. for lower and upper blanks of same.